In no part of the country are these four species more plentiful than in the south-eastern counties of England; and the neighbourhood of the metropolis seems to have some special attraction for them. Far from shunning “the busy haunts of men,” they appear to be nowhere more at home than in our gardens and orchards. The reason is obvious as soon as we become acquainted with their habits, and the nature of their food. We then discover that their motives are not so disinterested as we might suppose, since the real attraction is _fruit_. Upon this the parent birds live to a great extent; and after bringing up their young upon various kinds of insects which infest fruit trees—in which they unquestionably do us good service—they introduce their progeny at length to the more palatable pulp upon which they themselves have been faring so sumptuously. No wonder, then, that the large market-gardens of Kent, Surrey, and Middlesex should entice such numbers of these little birds to remain in their vicinity throughout the summer. The Blackcap (_Sylvia atricapilla_) is the earliest of the genus to make his appearance, and seems to be hardier also than any of his congeners. Many instances are on record of Blackcaps having remained in this country throughout the winter, and this has been noticed as particularly the case in Ireland. It is rather singular that Mr. Yarrell, in referring to the sister isle, says that the Blackcap “has been taken, once at least, in the north of Ireland,” as if he were of opinion that its occurrence there were doubtful, or at least extremely rare. Mr. Thompson, in his excellent “Natural History of Ireland” (vol. i. p. 183), notices the Blackcap as a regular summer visitant there; but he adds that it must be considered very local. In Scotland it is considered rare, being confined chiefly to the south; but since the observations were published from which these remarks are drawn, considerable changes seem to have taken place in the local distribution of many species of birds. This is notably the case with the Blackcap and Garden Warbler, both of which have followed cultivation, and now are found commonly in localities where twenty years ago they were either unknown or stated to be extremely rare.